Lately, I’ve doubted myself.
At the beginning of the year, I made some big changes to my life, switching to part-time work so I could focus on the writing side of my career and building up some freelance work. Lockdown has had an impact, but I’ve been pushing on anyway.
I’ve spent a lot of time and energy writing stories, working on submissions and applications for residencies or freelance work. What I haven’t been doing is working on my new novel in a consistent way, or heavily pitching for new work.
Every time a rejection comes in, I worry I’ve been expending my energy in the wrong place, working hard at the wrong things and sabotaging myself. I look at other people and wonder if I should be following their path, doing the things that have made them successful.
One night recently, I stayed up late to finish a submission and as I was about to send it off, two separate emails popped up in my inbox, minutes apart. Both were from magazines, accepting stories I’ve written for publication.
Those emails could not have come at a better time. It felt like the universe telling me: keep going.
It can be hard to have faith in yourself and your work, your dreams, especially when things aren’t moving fast enough in the right direction. Your inbox is full of rejections, you see other people winning prizes and sharing their successes and it feels like it will never be you. And maybe it won’t.
But you have to keep going. Push through the doubt and uncertainty. Learn from the rejections and the mistakes, sure, and get better. Just don’t give up.
When the time is right and the opportunity for you comes around, things will start to happen. We’re all on our own journeys, our stories are all different, but no less special.
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